“So I thought I was hot stuff, all the way through high school and into college. But I also came to realize—it took me long enough, I was so dumb—that my grandfather’s political and social views were right up there with Hitler’s.”

Whatever she’d expected, that hadn’t been it. “Really that extreme?”

He nodded. “Really. He would have joined something like Men of Liberty if none of his old golf buddies would have found out. I loved the old guy; since I was the oldest grandchild, oldest grandson, he made a lot of me. When he was still physically able, he took me out shooting and hunting, introduced me to lots of his cronies, encouraged me to make friends with their grandkids . . .”

“What did you think of that?”

“I never questioned it.” Bobo laughed, but not happily. “It just seemed natural to me. He would tell me why we shouldn’t let black people—of course, that wasn’t what he called them—live in the same buildings with us, date us, intermarry with us. He never got over integration, for God’s sake. He was still pissed that black people could eat in the same restaurant as him and Gram, go to school with me and my brother and my sisters. He practically screamed at Mom and Dad to get them to send us to some private school in Little Rock or even farther, maybe Memphis, but to give my parents the credit they’re due, they wanted us in town with them.”

“Good for your mom and dad. You didn’t buy what your grandfather was selling?” Fiji asked. She was painfully conscious that she must not cross any number of lines. “How did you keep from being totally messed up?”

“I’ll tell you something weird. Football and karate saved me. Football, because we were all one team and we were all colors.”

“Karate?” Fiji said. “Really?”

Bobo actually laughed. “It was great. My sensei was this amazing Asian guy who could kick major butt before breakfast, and one of my favorite class buddies was a black guy named Raphael Roundtree. And a white woman named Lily Bard. She could knock me down with her little finger. My grandfather revered women—as long as they were dependent and decorative.”

“So your class was a revelation to you.” She used the extravagant word with some hesitance. But Bobo hopped on it with glee.

“Yeah. No one in the class thought about what color or sex they were. Gaining the knowledge was the thing. So I knew from karate and football and my own common sense that there were just as many nice black people or Jews or gay people or whatever as the white people my grandfather thought were all so wonderful.” Revisited resentment made Bobo’s face look curiously young again.

“I’m assuming your grandfather didn’t have a good end.”